Gettysburg Sacrifice Saved The Union

EDITORIAL

July 02, 2013

As Americans know from the most famous speech ever given, Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg address, the Federal Army's victory at the Pennsylvania battleground not only preserved the union. It gave this nation a second chance, a "new birth of freedom."

That's something to commemorate.

And this week the nation does, observing the 150th anniversary of the battle of Gettysburg. Fought in south-central Pennsylvania July 1-3, 1863, it was the bloodiest and arguably most pivotal battle to take place on American soil.

Fresh from an impressive victory over Union forces in May 1863 at the battle of Chancellorsville in Virginia, Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee decided to take his armies north into Pennsylvania. What mischief he could do: Isolate Washington, D.C., attack Philadelphia, decimate already low public morale in the North, encourage the Copperheads to rebel against Lincoln, perhaps force a negotiated settlement of the war that would leave slavery intact.

But ruin for the South lay ahead when the two forces met by accident at Gettysburg.

Of 164,000 total troops, North and South, who fought under the burning July sun, 8,000 to 9,000 were killed and more than 35,000 were wounded or missing. Confederates took the worst of it, percentage-wise. (Of local note, five Connecticut infantry regiments and one light artillery unit saw action with the Federals at Gettysburg — about 1,300 troops. Of those, 68 were killed and 291 wounded.)

The Federal Army sacrifice on the blood-soaked hills and dales surrounding that small and charming town led to a Confederate retreat back to Virginia. A final, storied charge by rebel infantry on the third day had failed.

Gen. Lee's forces would never come north again. There would be almost two more years of war, but the victory delivered by Union troops at Gettysburg doomed any chance that the Southern cause would triumph or that it could get a favorable settlement of the war. There would be no disintegration of the United States of America, no independent nation of Southern secessionists, no continuation of the evil practice of slavery.

Gettysburg is indeed hallowed ground. It should be seen and experienced. The Gettysburg National Military Park is an accessible portal to history, tourist-friendly and just a few hours' drive from Connecticut.

More than a million visitors go each year. The park has a modern, spacious visitors' center with informative exhibits. Licensed guides can be hired to explain the three days in detail.

Visit Gettysburg. Understand its vastly significant contribution to our national narrative. Be in awe.